Archive for April, 2015

The U.S. Department of Labor is awarding grants to those Americans who have disabilities and are seeking San Antonio jobs, among other locations across the U.S.

The department announced the availability of approximately $15 million in grants through the Disability Employment Initiative to state workforce agencies to develop flexible and innovative strategies to increase the participation of people with disabilities in federally funded education and training programs.

Since 2010, the department has awarded grants worth more than $95 million through the DEI to 37 state workforce agencies in 26 states to improve education, training, and employment outcomes of youth and adults with disabilities. The funds are used to refine and expand workforce strategies proven to be successful, and enhance inclusive service delivery through the public workforce system.

Improvements include: increasing the accessibility of American Job Centers; training front-line AJC and partner staff; and increasing partnerships and collaboration across numerous systems that are critical for assisting youth and adults with disabilities in securing meaningful employment.

The department anticipates awarding eight grants — ranging from $1.5 to $2.5 million —to be spent in a 42-month period. Funding will be provided to at least one project for each of the following three target populations: adults with disabilities (ages 18 and older); youth with disabilities (ages 14-24); and individuals with significant disabilities (ages 14 and older).

Technology pay in the United States saw another year of hikes with technology professionals earning $89,450 on average annually, up two percent from 2013, according to Dice’s annual salary survey.

More than half (61%) of technology professionals earned higher salaries in 2014, most frequently citing a merit raise as the reason for the increase. Another 25 percent say they received higher wages due to changing employers within the year.

Satisfaction with wages declined. Half (52%) of technology professionals were satisfied with their compensation in 2014, down from 54 percent in 2013. In fact, satisfaction with salaries has dipped each year since 2012, when it peaked at 57 percent and salaries saw the biggest year-over-year jump to 5.3 percent.

“As demand for technology professionals rises and highly-skilled talent is harder to find, the pressure is being reflected where it counts: paychecks,” said Shravan Goli, President of Dice.com. “Still, tech pros are less happy with their earnings, signaling to companies that in order to recruit and retain the best candidates, offering more will be necessary.”

With compensation rising, tech professionals are slightly less likely to relocate for a new job this year (30%) as compared to last year (28%).

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, health care continued to add jobs in March (+22,000). Over the year, health care has added 363,000 jobs. In March, job gains occurred in ambulatory health care services (+19,000) and hospitals (+8,000), while nursing care facilities lost jobs (-6,000).

In March, employment in retail trade continued to trend up (+26,000), in line with its prior 12-month average gain. Within retail trade, general merchandise stores added 11,000 jobs in March.

Employment in mining declined by 11,000 in March. The industry has lost 30,000 jobs thus far in 2015, after adding 41,000 jobs in 2014. The employment declines in the first quarter of 2015, as well as the gains in 2014, were concentrated in support activities for mining, which includes support for oil and gas extraction.

Employment in food services and drinking places changed little in March (+9,000), following a large increase in the prior month (+66,000). Job growth in the first quarter of 2015 averaged 33,000 per month, the same as the average monthly gain in 2014.

Employment in other major industries, including construction, manufacturing, wholesale trade, transportation and warehousing, information, financial activities, and government, showed little change over the month.

Employment in professional and business services trended up in March (+40,000). Job growth in the first quarter of 2015 averaged 34,000 per month in this industry, below the average monthly gain of 59,000 in 2014. Within professional and business services, employment continued to trend up in architectural and engineering services (+4,000), computer systems design and related services (+4,000), and management and technical consulting services (+4,000).

Employment increased by 126,000 in March, and the unemployment rate was unchanged at 5.5 percent.

The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) was little changed at 2.6 million in March. These individuals accounted for 29.8 percent of the unemployed.